Episode 1205 - Tim Allen
Marc:all right let's do this how are you what the fuckers what the fuck buddies what the fuck nicks what the fuckadelics what's happening where you at you all right hey hey you i'm talking to you man snap out of it
Marc:You've watched that dish for 10 minutes.
Marc:Are you drifting?
Marc:Are you losing it?
Marc:Have you had enough?
Marc:Can you see the finish line?
Marc:You want to fuck the game up?
Marc:Isn't that the worst?
Marc:Oh, man, look how close we are to the finish line.
Marc:I'm going to throw the game.
Marc:Tim Allen is on the show today.
Marc:You know him.
Marc:Home Improvement.
Marc:He's a product producer.
Marc:He is like the genuine product of the comedy boom of the 80s, of the comedy club boom.
Marc:He's a guy that came up.
Marc:There's not many of them around, and not many of them had succeeded as big as he did.
Marc:He wasn't like a New York or L.A.
Marc:guy.
Marc:He was a Midwest guy that built his fucking machine, his funny vessel, during that boom.
Marc:It's very specific.
Marc:And, like, you know, Tim is known for a lot of things.
Marc:He's done a lot of things.
Marc:But I know people judge him because of his politics.
Marc:But the truth is, it's like we did the thing that, you know, when I got asked, you want to talk to Tim Allen?
Marc:Yeah, he's a comedy story that I haven't really heard.
Marc:You know, I know the road.
Marc:I've been out on the road.
Marc:But he is a product of...
Marc:of The Road, who made a billion dollars as a comic.
Marc:He's the real deal.
Marc:So we did what I do here sometimes.
Marc:He's a comedian.
Marc:We talked about mostly comedy.
Marc:We touch on other parts of the Tim Allen experience, but it's really just a couple of comics talking.
Marc:So...
Marc:these fucking I'm assuming they're allergies you know I did have a sort of a panic attack around like it's one of these things like a few days ago I don't think I talked about this
Marc:I was cutting a slab of mahi, and the phone rang, and I answered it.
Marc:And I'm in the middle of slicing the mahi.
Marc:And you know that horrible feeling of slicing into your hand, into your finger, where it's just like it doesn't hurt, but you know you've just done some damage.
Marc:It's a weird, specific feeling, a knife running through your flesh.
Marc:And I knew I did that, and I knew it was pretty bad.
Marc:And I pulled, my friend Sam's on the phone.
Marc:I'm like, fuck, man.
Marc:And I lopped a small chunk of my thumb off.
Marc:And those kind of things, you know, like I saw the flap was there, but the flap, that wasn't going back.
Marc:There was no, the flap was not going back.
Marc:So I had to go flapless.
Marc:I pulled the flap off.
Marc:And those are gushers, man.
Marc:They're gushers and it was gushing.
Marc:And it's hard to get to stop bleeding because there's no, there's nothing to coagulate, to congeal there.
Marc:You know, it's just a hole.
Marc:You're just missing a slab.
Marc:So I wrap it.
Marc:I bandage it.
Marc:I get off the phone.
Marc:I plan to go to a socially distanced outdoor AA meeting, which I needed.
Marc:And I'm keeping my hand elevated.
Marc:I don't want to bleed.
Marc:The blood is soaking into the bandage.
Marc:But I'm at the meeting double masked.
Marc:And it was good.
Marc:It was a lot of lit up newcomers.
Marc:And they were fucking talking the talk.
Marc:It was good.
Marc:I needed it.
Marc:I hadn't been to one in a while.
Marc:Don't like the Zoom business.
Marc:Nonetheless, I'm, you know, OK, so look, I'm not anonymous, but that's what I did.
Marc:Keep my sanity, ground myself into the rhythm, talking about control.
Marc:There's a context to the secret society.
Marc:There's a framework and you sit in it and you hear it and you feel it and people raise their hands.
Marc:Everyone who's an alcoholic, please raise your, you know, acknowledge here.
Marc:I can witness that.
Marc:Look at me.
Marc:And you kind of get in it and you feel the feels and, you know, it grounds you.
Marc:It humbles you.
Marc:It gets you back into it.
Marc:I've been going to those things for, you know, half of my life.
Marc:So on the way back, I'm like, I got to put gas in my car.
Marc:I got to go to self-serve 76 over by my house because my gas is getting a little low.
Marc:And I always like to have a full tank in case I have to run.
Marc:That's my thinking.
Marc:It's like, what if we got to get out and I've got a quarter tank?
Marc:That, you know, we probably won't get out anyways because of traffic, but I don't want to be the asshole that didn't have the gas to to get out from under the QAnon attack on liberal Los Angeles.
Marc:So I stop.
Marc:I get gas.
Marc:I'm worried about my hand holding the hand up.
Marc:I fill the gas up.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Do the nozzle.
Marc:I pay on the pay pad.
Marc:I get back in my car and I'm driving home and I rub my eye with my hand and in the middle of or maybe my nose.
Marc:Maybe I'm picking my nose with my finger on my other hand.
Marc:And I realize, dude, you didn't fucking sanitize.
Marc:I always sanitize.
Marc:I'm a vigilant motherfucker.
Marc:And there I am with my finger in my nose.
Marc:And it's been on the gas pump.
Marc:It's been on the pay pad.
Marc:I might as well have just stuck my face into a toilet bowl filled with fucking COVID.
Marc:What a fucking idiot.
Marc:So there you go.
Marc:So then I get home.
Marc:I take the sanitizer and I spray it up my nose, spray it on my hands.
Marc:And I'm like, I'm fucked.
Marc:And then it was pointed out to me that the odds are low.
Marc:It's really not how it's getting around.
Marc:But think about how many people.
Marc:So I'm still in a holding pattern around that.
Marc:But I believe I do not have it.
Marc:I believe that I have allergies.
Marc:I have not gotten that confirmed yet.
Marc:But I believe it's allergies.
Marc:Because sometimes, I don't know...
Marc:Maybe you guys can email me on this.
Marc:Like, I'm not congested, but I'm a little runny.
Marc:My throat's a little scratchy.
Marc:Sometimes my chest is a little tight.
Marc:Sometimes I'm feeling like I've been in a long pillow fight, like I'm all hazy and foggy and fucked.
Marc:And sometimes it feels like there's a weight on me.
Marc:And it feels like that my face, there's a lot of pressure behind my face.
Marc:But I'm not sneezy.
Marc:I'm a little runny and I'm not stuffy.
Marc:But like my throat's a little scratchy.
Marc:And it's just I just feel fucked up.
Marc:And this has been going on and off for a while now.
Marc:But I never had him as a kid.
Marc:Is that an allergy thing?
Marc:Is it a cancer thing?
Marc:I don't think it's a COVID thing, though.
Marc:You know, I should not have licked that fucking pay pad on the gas pump.
Marc:I mean, it was one thing to touch my face, but I was just on my knees licking the keys on the fucking punch pad.
Marc:The fuck is wrong with me?
Marc:I'm just trying to fucking keep it together, man.
Marc:My friend John turned me on to the...
Marc:drama rama song i hadn't heard it in a while that song work for food my buddy john jd's in the music racket does all right in the music business and he said a lot of people actually do all right in the music business but there's a lot he said 60 000 new songs a day are put out into the world 60 000 that's fucking nuts and some people aren't gonna make it man
Marc:No matter how much they feel they should or how good they think they are or even how good they are or how much they should.
Marc:It's a tough racket, the entertainment game.
Marc:And there's a moment that few people have.
Marc:It's in that fucking drama-rama song that he pointed out to me.
Marc:No one wants to pay me for my broken heart.
Marc:Tough moment, man.
Marc:Look, Tim Allen.
Marc:It's a good story.
Marc:There's jail involved.
Marc:His show, Last Man Standing, is in its final episodes.
Marc:That airs on Thursdays on Fox.
Marc:He's also in a new show for History Channel called Assembly Required.
Marc:It's a competition series for builders like Home Improvement meets Chopped.
Marc:That airs on Tuesdays.
Marc:And this is me talking to Tim Allen.
Tim Allen.
Marc:Where are you, man?
Marc:Wasn't really prepared for this.
Marc:With the big shift into the plague, you mean?
Marc:Did you get it?
Guest:No, I literally everybody around me got it.
Guest:I did.
Guest:We were at the studio and we have like a Disney cop that watches our show at all times.
Guest:And I like him.
Guest:He's such a push in your face.
Guest:Don't touch this.
Guest:Don't touch that.
Guest:He gets it.
Guest:He brings it to the set.
Guest:And it was really remarkable that he got my assistant chick.
Guest:He didn't do it.
Guest:Of course, nobody's doing the wardrobe and transpo, which takes care of my bus.
Guest:And everybody around me had it.
Guest:And I lucked out, ended up getting that first vaccine about a month and a month and a half ago.
Guest:And then the second vaccine last week.
Marc:Oh, so you got in under the old guy wire?
Guest:Yeah, maybe you could put it that way.
Guest:Old guy wire.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:The lucky thing about that is that I got out there and they were kind of PO'd at me at Dodger Stadium because they didn't think I looked old.
Guest:So it was a little compliment.
Guest:Somebody says, are you sure you should be getting this?
Guest:I said, yeah.
Guest:She goes, you're not old enough for this.
Guest:I went, well, aren't you nice?
Marc:That's very sweet.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But everyone got through it?
Marc:I'm terrified of it still.
Guest:Everyone got through it except my brother-in-law's dear father passed from it.
Guest:And it was quite a shock to all of our systems.
Guest:One of his kids got it.
Guest:The other kid had it and didn't know it.
Guest:His wife got it.
Guest:And then his poor father just passed.
Guest:And it was...
Guest:It's just like you hear for some of us that are either can't live in fear and deny it.
Guest:I just can't be around constantly worrying about stuff.
Guest:And I didn't I wasn't cavalier, whatever people comfortable with mass.
Guest:My neighbors always stop by their house.
Guest:I got kids and I got kids, masks, shake hands, antiseptic, whatever.
Guest:I've been going to my office from day one.
Guest:We have offices and production offices are separated.
Guest:And I have a car shop.
Guest:We build hot rods and we've been taking care.
Guest:It brings it home when you have a family member or a local family member that passes from it.
Guest:Even for a guy that's like me, I like... I mean, I'm interested in viruses as an entity.
Guest:Like, what are they?
Guest:I always have been.
Guest:And it's so strange that it kills in this, you know...
Guest:no matter what I say, it sounds like I'm, I'm making light of it.
Guest:You get a half a million people dead of anything.
Guest:There's nothing to say.
Guest:That's horrible.
Marc:Well, I mean, so it's, it's interesting that you, you have this curiosity about machines, cars, viruses.
Marc:I mean, what is that?
Marc:Is that something you've always, were you a science kid?
Guest:I mean, yeah, yeah.
Guest:Science kid.
Guest:And I love cars and tanks and military stuff and machines and,
Guest:i asked science questions and i took philosophy for five years in college which just is a i don't know i don't know are there any is there any use for philosophy i don't think there's some i think there's something to uh to to taking philosophy i think whether you know it or not it probably trains your brain a certain way makes you think about certain things i mean don't you reflect are you a reflective guy i'm more than a reflective guy my always when i talk to our professor dilworth i remember it the you know when you get to the fifth
Guest:year of it and you become a minor in it, there's about eight guys in the class that never speak because eventually you're just asking big questions.
Guest:And I said, did any of these guys ever have a happy life?
Guest:Were they all like desperately depressed?
Guest:They're not late.
Guest:There wasn't like a comedy philosopher.
Guest:And these days, people mistake my philosophy for a political view.
Guest:And I said, it's more like an observation if I just watch.
Guest:And that's what philosophy has been really
Guest:uncomfortable because I'll ask people an overview question.
Guest:That's interesting.
Guest:Well, where did you get that information?
Guest:They said, why do you care?
Guest:Well, it's important to get as an observer to pick up facts that are outside of you or is there an objective truth is what I ask sometimes.
Guest:Is there something a priori?
Guest:And it's an old philosophical comment.
Guest:Do we make up truth as we go along?
Guest:It would appear today that we do.
Guest:Is there a truth outside of
Guest:Your belief, and I tell my family, I said, the sun exists whether I believe in it or not.
Guest:It has nothing to do with my belief in it.
Marc:No denying that.
Marc:But what is it thinking, Tim?
Marc:What does the sun want from us?
Marc:What's it trying to say, Tim?
Guest:It just says, get hot.
Guest:And eventually, again, my kid, I told her this the other day.
Guest:I had a mental breakdown.
Guest:It used to be Ma Bell or what was it called?
Guest:Yeah, it was.
Guest:I grew up in Denver when I was a kid.
Guest:We had a whole big, long movie about the sun.
Guest:And I was fascinated about this big furnace.
Guest:And at the end of it, they said the sun will turn into a big red sun, then a white dwarf, and it will go away and we all die.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:The whole class went home for Easter.
Guest:And I said, wait a second.
Guest:What's the point?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I sat there so depressed.
Guest:The teacher went, Tim, you got to go.
Guest:What's the point?
Guest:Why study?
Guest:What are we doing?
Marc:This is horrible.
Marc:Didn't you guys hear it?
Marc:It was right there in the movie.
Marc:It's over.
Guest:Right there in the movie.
Guest:We're dead.
Guest:What are we?
Guest:What's the museum for?
Guest:What are we studying?
Guest:What are we taking books for?
Guest:Forget the library.
Guest:Tim, it's 4.6 billion years away.
Guest:I don't care.
Marc:See, you almost became a philosopher.
Guest:Yes.
Marc:You grew up in Denver?
Guest:Yeah, I grew up in Denver.
Guest:Dora Moore was our elementary school.
Marc:Still there.
Marc:Oh, wow.
Marc:I went to Mark Twain Elementary in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Guest:Wow.
Guest:That's where my aunt was from.
Marc:Really?
Marc:Well, it's sort of connected.
Marc:Colorado, New Mexico, Southwest.
Guest:When you come there, my father was killed when I was a kid.
Guest:My mom moved us back to Michigan.
Guest:It's so different when you come from the Midwest and the Southwest, that whole different.
Guest:I said, I never, when I grew up, I never saw any difference between when they were Hispanic came up later in my life.
Guest:I didn't know anything different from people that spoke Spanish.
Guest:It never occurred to me that they were any different.
Marc:Yeah, when we grew up, when I grew up in Albuquerque, it was probably 70% Latino.
Marc:Denver, it was just, yeah, I mean, you know, the names when I grew up in school were Chavez, Martinez, Archuleta, Sanchez, all the guys.
Guest:The guy was Manuel Apodaca.
Guest:That was the guy.
Marc:We had a governor, Apodaca.
Guest:He was the king of our high school because he had the first facial hair.
Marc:Oh, yeah?
Marc:Did he have those?
Guest:Oh, my God, the guy had a mustache.
Guest:I didn't get a mustache at six.
Marc:Six.
Marc:Yeah, that's young.
Marc:So wait, your old man passed away when you were young?
Guest:A traffic accident.
Guest:I never knew much about it.
Guest:He went to a University of Colorado football game with my other... There's six in my natural family.
Guest:Really?
Guest:There's nine now when my mom remarried.
Guest:And they took them to a...
Guest:a buffalo football game university of colorado and never came home the other almost car allegedly a inebriated driver flipped on top of his car killed him right in my mom's lap and two of my older brothers whole car was filled with kids it was very very fortunate nobody else died jesus that's fucking horrendous i don't need do you do you ever like have you ever processed or tried to figure out what effect that had on you
Guest:As a philosophy major and a pretty church-going guy, my whole family, we've been churchgoers, whether we liked it or not.
Guest:And I've always been ahead of, as they say, a God of my misunderstanding.
Guest:I never could understand, never had a good answer from our minister at age 11.
Guest:Where is he?
Guest:He's in a better place.
Guest:And I was...
Guest:Like pissed off.
Guest:I said, better place.
Guest:Why don't we just start there?
Guest:What are we doing here?
Guest:What's this better place thing?
Guest:And who is this friendly God that takes your dad from you?
Guest:Cut to, I love my children and I love my life.
Guest:So if I'm going to blame it for all the anger in my life, I've got to give it credit for all the good things.
Guest:It's really hard to process that a bad thing can, if it hadn't happened, I'd still be living in Denver.
Guest:He was an insurance man.
Guest:I probably would have gone in that business.
Guest:I don't know.
Marc:That's interesting.
Marc:Yeah, I think as you get older, I think that's the choice.
Marc:You can't really afford to be, you know, to have sort of woulda, shoulda or blaming.
Marc:You know, you have to spin it the other way.
Marc:I mean, you have to.
Marc:Yeah, that's a I mean, that's a pretty healthy position to have to realize, like, well, if anything would have happened any differently, I wouldn't be where I am right now.
Marc:And you're a pretty lucky motherfucker, right?
Guest:Yeah, it's very uncomfortable, though, when I use that same philosophical perspective to anything.
Guest:I tend to get philosophical about it.
Guest:And there is a woman, a wonderful woman, Donna Heard, who I knew who worked for the Reagan administration.
Guest:She was just almost the brightest, brightest mind.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And she said it talking about history.
Guest:And she always would say.
Guest:When people argue, especially politics, well, it was all Clinton's fault or all Reagan's fault or whatever.
Guest:And she goes, when is the point?
Guest:When is the day that we stop?
Guest:History starts here.
Marc:Right.
Guest:And right.
Guest:Everybody always goes back a day.
Guest:Well, what about the day before that?
Guest:What about the day prior to that?
Guest:Yeah.
Yeah.
Guest:It gets very uncomfortable when you chase things up river.
Guest:And I used to love that as a kid.
Guest:We used to go up in the mountains of Colorado with my father when he was alive and search.
Guest:I love to search where rivers came from.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And it's kind of alarming when you get to the very beginning of the Colorado River, which is way up above Rocky Mountain National Park.
Guest:And it starts with snow melt and a couple little creeks.
Marc:There's no hole with water coming out of it.
Guest:Right.
Yeah.
Marc:It's it's it's sort of uneventful that you got uneventful.
Guest:You got to be careful upriver.
Guest:You might not find you might, as they said on the Planet of the Apes, when when Taylor's got the horse, he goes, well, what will I find Zerus?
Guest:And he goes, you might not like what you find.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But you felt like you did carry like a chip on your shoulder for years.
Guest:I still have a I asked I spent some time in incarcerated and I used to ask in there all the time.
Guest:I said, why do you why is it that you're talking as Abraham?
Guest:I used to love reading about Abraham in the Bible.
Guest:He was innocent enough.
Guest:He could talk right to God.
Guest:I don't think that's good.
Guest:God, why don't we why do we kill everybody?
Guest:And God says, well, what about 30 percent?
Guest:I mean, I love that if you could have that conversation.
Guest:And I asked a couple of times, why is it always a bus full of Catholic girls school that flips and dies?
Guest:And it's not a bus on its way to prison.
Guest:It always seems like it's innocent people that you kill.
Guest:I find you very cruel sometimes.
Guest:And sometimes the vision or the answer I got back from my version, if I'm ever humble enough to hear the creator said, this isn't quite what you think it is.
Guest:If I showed you what was behind the curtain, trust me, you're not going to understand it.
Guest:And you'd go, oh, I get it.
Guest:And then you wouldn't want to be here anymore.
Guest:So it's not quite what you think it is.
Marc:So that seems like a fairly genuine religious experience.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Well, I've had a series of them every now and then.
Guest:I said, I think Solomon in Proverbs said, ask for wisdom.
Guest:It's it's all you got to do is ask.
Guest:You'll get an answer.
Guest:And I add to that.
Guest:But you might not like what you hear or you might not understand it.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Well, what was the like what led up to were you doing comedy before you you did prison?
Guest:No, I was a I was an F up.
Guest:I just didn't know.
Guest:And so I kind of relate to this misinterpretation.
Guest:kids that don't have, I didn't listen to anybody.
Guest:After my old man died, I really just played games with people and told adults what they wanted to hear and then stole their booze.
Guest:I never really, I could really, I was Eddie Haskell.
Guest:Yes, Mrs. Cleaver, no Mrs. Cleaver.
Guest:I knew exactly what adults wanted.
Guest:Make your bed, be polite, use a napkin, and then I'd go steal everything in the house.
Guest:And so I really was a,
Guest:look back i did i should have gone in the military and a military friend of mine said you probably would be a good officer if you could get out of the brig because the way you are i hate authority and i would have never because i don't trust it i would have never been i could have never gone through the military i think i would have gotten myself in jail or it does what do they when they throw you out right because i just don't take directions well and i was lost so you're like you were you're heading into a life of crime
Guest:Yeah, I didn't realize that's what I was doing.
Guest:You know, when you get into it, it's like I relate to those movies where all of a sudden you turn around and go, am I going to be doing this the rest of my life?
Guest:And it's a terribly stressful existence.
Marc:What, crime?
Guest:Drugs.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:But you were drinking and drugging at the time, too.
Guest:Well, I did.
Guest:It's odd.
Guest:That movie Scarface.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Did everything that he said.
Guest:Don't get greedy and don't do your own stuff.
Marc:Right.
Marc:And you did both.
Guest:That was the two things he said.
Guest:Remember, he was meet my little friend.
Guest:I did a machine gun.
Guest:I eventually succumbed to it where I was getting greedy and I was doing my own stuff.
Marc:And and then they got you.
Guest:Well, it was a group of people that got me.
Guest:We were college kids, and a bunch of the people that overdid it rolled on two of us.
Guest:So two of us took it for about 20 guys.
Marc:Now, the prison situation, it's just interesting to me, and I'm just only pressing it in the sense that I just read this book that a comic wrote.
Marc:He self-published it, and it's a great book.
Marc:It's called Running the Light.
Marc:And the protagonist of that book is a guy who was of your generation, who did some time, and he claims in the book that he learned how to be funny in prison.
Marc:Now, I don't know what your experience is,
Marc:in prison was, but it just dawned, I mean, maybe that you were the inspiration for that character.
Marc:I don't know.
Guest:I learned literally how to live day by day and I learned how to shut up.
Guest:You definitely want to learn how to shut up.
Marc:Really?
Marc:Was it a hardcore prison or?
Guest:It was a level three federal prison eventually I got to.
Guest:I went through three different ones.
Guest:They move you around.
Guest:This was for federal prisoners that were on, had done five of 10 or
Guest:seven to 14 they're halfway through their sentences so they exhibited a modicum of good behavior but it's still people that of course nobody was guilty right and i learned to just shut up do what i was told it was first time ever i did what i was told and played the game but i'll tell you what you're right
Guest:People don't laugh.
Guest:There's an edge to it.
Guest:You don't want to be sarcastic in prison.
Guest:Being funny and doing funny voices is fun.
Guest:Sarcasm doesn't go over too well.
Guest:That I learned.
Guest:sarcasm.
Guest:It's not, there's no place for me to, well, I'll see you later.
Guest:I'm going to run over here.
Guest:There's no running over here.
Marc:You don't want to be the misunderstood smart ass.
Guest:That happened twice and that never happened again.
Guest:Goofy faces, funny jokes and weird voices.
Guest:One thing being sarcastic.
Guest:It didn't work out.
Marc:It wasn't so much a prison was working.
Marc:It was the population of prison.
Marc:That was terrifying.
Yeah.
Guest:It is.
Guest:It's not even terrifying.
Guest:It's funny that, and I don't say this lightly and anybody who's been incarcerated, it's surprising what the human being will get used to.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And eventually after eight months, I got, I got used to it.
Guest:There was okay times.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:A guy like there's, you know, Saturday we got better food.
Guest:I eventually got, uh, uh,
Guest:had one from a holding cell arrangement to my own cell, which is embarrassingly funny to me.
Guest:I called my parents or my mom at the time at a Thanksgiving dinner.
Guest:I was interrupting dinner.
Guest:I get a phone call and I called her how proud I was.
Guest:I got my own cell and you're really proud of it.
Guest:And she goes, well, that's good.
Guest:Steve graduated Purdue.
Guest:Jeff's on his way to Michigan state and my oldest, one of my oldest sons got his own cell.
Guest:So,
Guest:Don't ever call here again.
Marc:They wouldn't talk to you anymore?
Marc:Well, she was kidding.
Marc:Well, I guess it's kind of like college, but you can't leave or party.
Guest:You know what it was more like to me was camp.
Guest:If you ever went to a day camp.
Guest:You got really uncomfortable getting to know who's who.
Guest:There's always the tough guy.
Guest:There's always the people that are funny.
Guest:There's the people that are... I've run that.
Guest:I've changed schools twice.
Guest:Anybody who's moved, like military families or anybody's moved, you see the platform, which is funny.
Guest:I'm looking at it now in today's world.
Guest:There's nobody responsible anymore.
Guest:It's like the whole world is...
Guest:camp or high school i remember that commons in high school there's a cool group the athletes and the cheerleaders the av group that i hung out with kind of i like the guys that put the film strip together there's the shop guys the geeks and there was kind of chameleons moved around and then then there was the people that had no friends or they're very quiet which one were you i kind of floated around i'd been to two different high schools so i knew how to play the game and but i'm i'm funny man and when you're funny
Guest:In my case, when you're truly funny, and I believe I'm truly funny, you own it.
Guest:People like being around.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You can go wherever you want.
Guest:Go wherever you want.
Guest:I had a real bad complexion, so I wasn't a real handsome kid.
Guest:And still girls kind of like me and guys want to hang out with me.
Guest:And I hung out with the football players as I like going to the gym.
Guest:I was a gym rat.
Guest:So they taught me that.
Guest:I love being around the football players.
Guest:I love the shop guys.
Guest:I kind of floated around.
Marc:When did you start hitting the booze hard?
Guest:I just told one of my family members this.
Guest:I watched cowboy movies.
Guest:Every cowboy movie I saw...
Guest:as a kid they'd ride horses they're dusty and they pull up and they'd wrap the horse real quick around that bar yeah they'd run in they get that brown liquor yeah and they go give me a whiskey and now the bottle comes out then they just a shot of whiskey and they go ah yeah all right yeah they dig right off and i go what that stuff's got to be pretty damn refreshing that one shot of that at like 10 years old i went down to
Guest:a friend's house and just poured Jim Beam into a jigger, not a shot glass.
Guest:It's two and a half shots, actually.
Guest:And down to, just like the TV, just the whole thing, it was like I drank a bottle of gasoline.
Guest:I couldn't believe it.
Guest:Any normal person would have said, that's it.
Guest:I said, well, maybe I needed more water.
Guest:I got used to it.
Guest:And alcohol for me, I'm 20, going on 23 years sober.
Guest:and clean up everything.
Guest:I said that alcohol never affected me like the other guys.
Guest:I never, I could drink
Guest:copious amounts even as a young kid and neither guys are vomiting or driving through glass windows yeah it never affected me like i think that's funny though because i got it too i got i got i got 21 years sober and like it's just that that that feeling of like you know you get sick and you're like maybe i'm not doing it right it's not exactly well i never had like i never i had one blackout in my life when i had just gotten my grandma died and she gave all my brothers uh
Guest:nine grand.
Guest:And she said, buy a car.
Guest:I know how you boys love cars.
Guest:Don't save it.
Guest:Buy yourself a car.
Guest:So I did.
Guest:And I love that car.
Guest:And I came home and it was parked kind of sideways in my driveway at college.
Guest:I went, what the hell?
Guest:And everybody in class, the next thing, you have never been funnier, which is the most frustrating part of that blackout.
Guest:I go, what did I do?
Guest:You were jumping across cars.
Guest:They said, that explains the debt in my hood.
Guest:I go, yeah, you slipped.
Guest:And your elbow hits your own hood and you dented that drove everybody home.
Guest:And those are the days.
Guest:And I drove everybody home, drove everybody home.
Guest:I don't remember a thing.
Guest:And it's you.
Guest:I look back on those things and I'm, you know, this is the sober guy stuff.
Guest:I have so much shame at the things that I did that I was OK, especially driving people around.
Guest:And it coming from a dad that was killed that way.
Guest:it's, it's difficult to get past that.
Guest:What you, what I heard, I heard it last night at a special meeting about it, by the stuff that's happened that you think is okay.
Guest:And I said, that's a, that's a vicious little drug alcohol.
Guest:And I, my, one of my buddies is a very famous doctor.
Guest:Won't out him here.
Guest:And we were doing, he's on TV a lot.
Guest:And I said, if they've,
Guest:They were going to powder alcohol, and I think I remember this probably three years ago, and they okayed it so you could put it in anything.
Guest:And I think even the FDA went, is this really a good idea?
Marc:Yeah, is this necessary?
Guest:If you powdered alcohol, you'd really see what it was.
Guest:It's not a very good thing for us.
Marc:I'm incredibly grateful to be sober and I know things would have went differently and yeah it is sort of when you think about what you were able to rationalize you know what I mean and part of it was like you were proud of yourself man I mean if you got away with it or if you didn't wreck the car or you made it home you know you were like I did it I did it the thing that you said earlier is I said and it's
Guest:Even if you're not curious enough, the first 80 pages of that, the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous, the story for, I wish I'd never read it when the alcoholic still alive.
Guest:I wish I'd never read it because I read it.
Guest:I go, this is some weird book in the twenties or something.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And I'm going, how do I'm relating to this?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:This is horrible, but try it at different.
Guest:Maybe I'm not doing it right.
Guest:And I think of all the times, you know what?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I'm going to have just heavy days and I must put it on a calendar.
Guest:Actually, the Thursday and Friday, that's going to be heavy.
Guest:And then try wine or.
Guest:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:Grateful is the word.
Guest:I love my life.
Guest:I'm not any more mentally stable.
Guest:I have the same issues I had.
Guest:I can't now I can't hide from them.
Marc:Well, I mean, but also it seems that, you know, you process through the comedy.
Marc:I mean, this show, The Last Man Standing, that character, you know, whether, you know, you feel that way or you don't, it's a way to sort of deal with that.
Marc:There's sort of a mild river of anger through that guy.
Guest:You know, yeah.
Guest:It's a very curious thing that you just said that because we were watching the History Channel show I just finished.
Guest:And I don't know which guy I am.
Guest:Tim the Tool Man Taylor was kind of the early Men or Pigs tour I did for Showtime into a sitcom.
Guest:And just goofy.
Guest:Still, I said, and I've said this many times, I was a masculinist most of my life.
Guest:I was raised by a very strong mother and grandma and just a lot of very...
Guest:not just women that were so much women, they were men.
Guest:I don't mean it like that.
Guest:I didn't think of them.
Guest:When women are strong, they have a different kind of strength than I'm used to from men.
Guest:So I'm used to that strength from women.
Guest:And it's intimidating.
Guest:And it's also emasculating because they come off as smarter.
Guest:And maybe they are.
Guest:But I became very
Guest:male oriented and it came out in my first act and I said men are pigs that was my joke you know and I'd go aren't they and the women go yeah and I go men are pigs dirty guys men are pigs right women they go yeah it's just too bad we own everything and then hey wait a second and that was my joke Mike Baxter is that same guy with an edge to him and then I find the comedy there's a part of me that's that is angry all the time
Guest:And it's just a pissy guy.
Guest:And it's funny that I don't know, because the last tour I did was just, God, when are we going to go back into rooms, sitting right next to a guy with his mouth open going, ha, ha, ha.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Never thought you'd miss that, huh?
Guest:I miss it.
Guest:I miss it terribly.
Guest:I can't deny it.
Guest:And I said that the guy that I was doing the last tour, I'd get angrier and angrier on stage.
Guest:And it's funny.
Guest:The guy that I presented, and then I don't know...
Guest:Which one's which?
Guest:Here at home, even my wife and kids go, you're kind of a patient guy.
Guest:And I said, you wouldn't know it internally.
Guest:But I've learned that from 23 years.
Guest:I got 23 seconds now where I don't say anything.
Guest:I don't respond.
Guest:And there was an old sober guy that passed away that one time I said, you don't say much.
Guest:And he goes, because no one asked me anything.
Guest:And you realize is you don't realize how often you give your opinions and nobody asks for.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And that's what I'm seeing today is I don't see serenity or somebody, a thoughtful person or somebody with ethics.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:You know, I don't see.
Marc:You don't see that in yourself.
Yeah.
Guest:I only see it in myself because I learned to listen to other individuals.
Guest:It's a really weird skill where I don't, I've learned it in my program where you just listen.
Marc:Yeah, I learned it doing this show.
Guest:You just listen.
Guest:You don't, the guy didn't ask, make it, it's okay for the other person just to talk and without you going, you know what you should do?
Marc:Isn't it amazing how many times you have the impulse to jump in with nothing?
Marc:Where you're sort of like, oh, I could, yeah, you know what?
Marc:Nah.
Guest:And it's a remarkable skill.
Guest:And I watched two guys argue both on different sides of the political fence.
Guest:And I said, if you would both allow each other just to finish that thought and don't say anything, then walk away.
Guest:The next guy comes back an hour later and he gets to have his whole point of view.
Guest:you would be very difficult to deny the other person had a point.
Marc:Right.
Marc:But then the audience would be gone and no commercials would be sold.
Guest:That's a long hour.
Marc:But so when did you... So you did a couple of years inside in the prison for Coke, right?
Marc:Yes.
Marc:And when you got out, I mean, how did the hustle become comedy?
Marc:I mean, you were still... When you got out... I didn't think I was there.
Guest:I really thought...
Guest:Once they realized I'm not a flight risk, I'm not going anywhere.
Guest:They could have put me in my garage for a year.
Guest:I would have done that.
Guest:I was very contrite.
Guest:I put a lot of things together in my life during sentencing.
Guest:And it was like eight months.
Guest:I didn't think they would do that.
Guest:And neither did my attorney.
Guest:And then they came hard on me.
Guest:And right before I went, I went to a...
Guest:I put my list together of what I wanted in my life for the first time ever.
Guest:I put down a list of the things I wanted to do.
Guest:which I still to this day, I can't believe how simple it is.
Guest:And I did all of them.
Guest:And then I kept making lists.
Guest:And so I went to a local comedy club based on a dare from another dear friend of mine who worked in an ad agency.
Guest:He said, why don't you do that?
Guest:What are you, chicken?
Guest:I can't believe I did something because some other guys called me chicken.
Guest:And I did it.
Guest:I went up and did 30 minutes at the Comedy Castle in Walled Lake, Michigan.
Guest:And save the best for last, which is a great thing to remember, because the audience really only remembers the last what you say.
Guest:Good night.
Guest:Right before you say good night.
Guest:That was a great joke.
Guest:And they remembered it.
Guest:I didn't do so well, but I did.
Guest:I recall what would happen if the lady was doing the Pillsbury commercial, got drunk and put the doughboy in the oven instead of the crescent rolls.
Yeah.
Guest:So then you'd have a little Billsbury Doughboy banging who baked our little doughboy.
Guest:We'd really like to know.
Guest:He's banging on that window.
Guest:He swells up golden brown.
Guest:And it got a big laugh.
Guest:And I set all that up with the owner of the comedy club, Mark Ridley.
Guest:He said, come back.
Guest:You know, you got something.
Guest:I said, I'll be back, but it's going to be a while because I think I'm going to do some time.
Guest:And he was shocked, but I set everything up to give me something to do because I realized at one point, I think I'm going to do time.
Guest:And I said, so I set myself up, I sold, I put my car away and really prepared myself and my family for this.
Guest:I knew bad things were going to happen, but I wanted something to come out.
Guest:I wanted to be able to have come out with something.
Marc:How old were you?
Guest:23 so you knew that so in the back of your mind you had a plan you were going to do stand-up I wanted to be on the Johnny Carson show that's it I just said however that would be I love that show and Don Rickles and all the guys around that young cross love that when he wave him over I just love the early Carson show that's what I want to do is be one of those guys well you know I must have been like when you were younger and angry and pissed off and sad about your old man I mean you know you got to get some laughs
Guest:Well, I was always never not a cut up, no matter what.
Guest:I never considered that that was something you could do, especially the way I made jokes.
Guest:Still, I don't write jokes like some of the great guys.
Guest:I don't do that.
Guest:I do bits and then make up characters.
Guest:It's pretty peculiar what I do, really.
Guest:And I did.
Guest:I've always been funny like that.
Guest:I just never thought you could do
Guest:I didn't know how to translate that into an act.
Marc:We do long form pieces.
Marc:I mean, they become pieces.
Marc:You've got an act.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:I looked at Rodney.
Guest:I knew pretty well.
Guest:Dangerfield.
Guest:Before he passed away, his wife, we went by his house.
Guest:The paperwork in that house and his bits and all of his sketches, you're going, Jesus.
Guest:I felt I've got like...
Guest:Yeah, I've got a lot of legal pads.
Guest:I do it in little sentences that I know what the key.
Guest:Yeah, me too.
Marc:Yeah, that's how I do it.
Marc:Just you make lists.
Guest:You make a little list of stuff.
Guest:And then I got keywords that remind me of the joke.
Marc:and i don't think i write like some of the the some of the guys so it's so funny to me though because i you know it's like you're beating yourself up about that on some level and i do the same way too because i you know i do long form bits and i do pieces and they evolve over time on stage but i there's still a part of me i watch david tell or i watch one of the guys who i know are joke guys and i'm like i'm not not working hard enough yeah i can't well i can't well i think i hang around a lot with leno and
Guest:Jay is out.
Guest:When we were out, he did a whole bunch of last-minute standings.
Guest:He's doing one this week, one of our last four.
Guest:It breaks my heart.
Guest:But he said he was out like 300 days or something, like 200 days.
Guest:doing anything and jay comes up there's nobody does like 1950s jokes better than jay he's going hang on this guy comes in none of the stuff he does on stage because i'm a little blue yeah oh blue in the way that i'll use i use testicles or balls or f this f that i i use language and my wife just she brings her family she goes i can't believe you how much you swear oh my god i i
Guest:I literally, even my management said, I think you said fuck 70 times.
Guest:I said, sometimes I'm in that mood and it's not, I'm not doing it to piss anybody off.
Guest:I don't know what it is about me in language.
Guest:Sometimes I say on stage, it's lazy.
Guest:There's probably a better word.
Guest:Yeah, I guess.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Sometimes it feels, I don't know.
Guest:I said, I don't make a big deal about it.
Guest:It's I'm kind of mean on stage, which I love.
Guest:I said, one of my favorite bits is I said about kids.
Guest:I said, everything about kids is that like this.
Guest:Let me be honest.
Guest:I hate goddamn kids.
Guest:And that joke, for some reason, my wife hates and I get the biggest laugh.
Guest:I said, I hate your kids.
Guest:I hate my I'm not that fond of my kids, but I really hate your.
Guest:Nothing is dumber than human children.
Guest:And above all, they take the attention away from me in a room.
Guest:The fact that I make jokes of kids.
Guest:And truly, the kids in my neighborhood sense this, and they're like cats.
Guest:The more they know I don't like them, the more they hang around me.
Guest:This neighbor's kid, who every time I come over, I give her a different nickname.
Guest:And this kid remembers it, and she talks about me all the time, and I'm not there.
Guest:And now I am starting to like her.
Marc:Well, the thing is, Tim, it's like you're the guy like, you know, you're mean, but you can't not be funny mean.
Marc:You know, so kids are going to get a kick out of you.
Marc:They're not going to read it that way.
Guest:They don't.
Guest:I was a mean, horrible Santa Claus offstage.
Guest:And when I wasn't on the camera, I was an angry...
Guest:made up comedian that didn't have any idea what five hours of makeup was like.
Guest:It was horrific.
Guest:And then these kids wouldn't behave.
Guest:And I'm swearing, swearing dressed like Santa Claus until I finally realized even then one of the Disney people says, Tim.
Guest:you can't keep dropping the F-bomb dressed as Santa Claus around these kids.
Guest:Oh, God.
Guest:And, of course, I'm going, I'm not goddamn Santa.
Guest:I'm an actor.
Guest:He said, they don't know that.
Guest:You can't tell these kids, literally scream, there's no such thing as Santa.
Guest:And I went, okay, I got it.
Guest:Then I had to play this...
Guest:It was the most amazing experience for a guy like me.
Guest:I don't like kids that much, but these kids love being around this kind of pissy Santa.
Guest:And I learned to be a pissy, nice guy.
Marc:Well, the thing is, I think kids resonate when they see adults behaving a certain way that they don't see at home.
Marc:They know it's not quite right and it's exciting.
Guest:I think so, too.
Guest:I think kids, like I'm saying with pets, they kind of like it when you're
Guest:not this this gushy guy or gushy person maybe i shouldn't say that because i said i like when people are nice to kids of course yeah nice kids and i would never hurt a child or do anything appropriate right being inappropriate all that but i like being a smart ass and you're getting right in their face going are you looking at me yeah stop looking yeah i love doing that with babies because they they just no don't stop it
Guest:Look someplace else.
Guest:I don't want to look at you.
Marc:So how long had you been doing it, though, when everything started happening?
Marc:So you come back, you get out of jail, and you just start knocking it out?
Guest:I knew what I wanted to do immediately.
Guest:I said, this is not something I want to do.
Guest:And literally, I put my nose in.
Guest:what i really wanted to have worked in a gun store believe it or not and um i believe that's why i got why why wouldn't i believe that you worked at a gun store well i work downstairs i like i like weapons i've always liked weapons weapons cars technology viruses just like guns i've always i've always there's guns and cameras have that clicking weird i love
Guest:And I worked in a gun store.
Guest:It was like outdoor men.
Guest:I worked in a store just like that.
Guest:And I was a great salesman.
Guest:At the night, I went and did the clubs.
Guest:And at one point, I sold a Browning or a Beretta.
Guest:It was an over and under shotgun gun.
Guest:And I wasn't in the gun department, probably shouldn't on parole.
Guest:I don't think you're allowed to, but I don't think we ever checked into that.
Guest:And I sold the shotgun.
Guest:I wasn't allowed to sell the shotgun because I wasn't in that department.
Guest:But there was a customer that kind of liked my attitude.
Guest:And I learned about it.
Guest:I sold him a Browning gun.
Guest:bamboo orvis bamboo rod which are very expensive and then I went and sold him a shotgun because the gun guy Leo was not there and that I went to the owner who I still know I think he just passed away and I said listen I just sold an $8,500 shotgun and a $4,200 fly fishing setup and I want to commission on that
Guest:And he goes, no, we don't do that.
Guest:I know, but there's no reason for me to work here and do that if I don't get a commission off that.
Guest:And he goes, well, then...
Guest:Don't work here.
Guest:And I left.
Guest:And I said, I had to turn comedy into, it sounds like nothing, but I had to turn comedy into 500 bucks a week somehow.
Guest:So I started going to different gigs.
Guest:And that was when we rioted.
Guest:The comedy store did this whole thing where comics should get paid.
Guest:For a while, we were slave labor.
Marc:You were there in 73?
Guest:I wasn't there.
Guest:I was in Detroit.
Guest:It spread everywhere where every comic had to get, what, 25 bucks a set.
Yeah.
Guest:I think we're still making 25 bucks.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Then they opened up all the road work and I started, I was quickly able to get my rent 500 bucks a month.
Guest:And then I, Bobby Slayton, I think, or whoever did the tonight show, they were getting up.
Guest:To nine grand a month or nine grand a week.
Marc:You really are a product of that boom.
Marc:You're the guy.
Guest:All of a sudden, you're going, how much are you making?
Marc:Doing door deals.
Guest:I can't remember the guys that were Tom Sharp.
Guest:I was thinking of the guys that were starting to headline.
Marc:Jake Johansson?
Guest:Yes, yes, yes.
Guest:Shanley.
Guest:Shanley.
Marc:Yeah, Shanling.
Marc:Yep.
Marc:Yep.
Guest:It's making big money.
Guest:And I go, my God, you could do that.
Guest:You could make a living.
Guest:And that's when the two worlds collided.
Guest:Jenny.
Guest:Those.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Shit.
Guest:He and I switched acts one night.
Guest:I loved his act so much.
Guest:He did my act.
Guest:I did his.
Guest:That's how good his act was.
Guest:I could just do his act.
Guest:And he had on.
Guest:We were road comics.
Guest:We were a very different breed than the guys that hung out at Catch in New York and the guys that hung out at the improv and the comedy store.
Guest:I'd come out to L.A.
Guest:and look for Macaulay.
Guest:And now I'm doing 45 minutes on the road and killing myself.
Guest:I mean, between drinking and drugging and doing comedy.
Marc:So you and Rich Jenny were buddies?
Guest:Yeah, real close.
Guest:He was, I said, I never knew his torment.
Guest:I never knew.
Guest:I never knew.
Guest:Well, he never seen.
Guest:I never read any of that in him.
Marc:I was working his weekend in Schaumburg improv when he committed suicide.
Guest:I just never saw any of that coming.
Guest:I mean, nothing.
Guest:He never was like that.
Guest:He was one of the guys.
Guest:I think he had a break.
Marc:He had a psychotic break.
Guest:But I knew him real well.
Guest:I never knew any of that part of him, and it broke my heart because he's a wonderful guy.
Guest:I've said this to many guys.
Guest:We don't last long.
Guest:It seems like comics.
Guest:It seems like it either burns you out or something.
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:There's not many of us.
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:Some of us do.
Marc:Some of you do.
Marc:I mean, it's like, you know, he the weird thing is, is like, how would you know you guys?
Marc:There's a I think the scary thing is, is both of you deal with your demons and your anger and your sadness in the same way.
Marc:So like, you know, how the hell are you going to know unless, you know, someone's going to be, you know, you're going to have those conversation.
Marc:The sort of rogues gallery of 80s comics, you know, really ran the spectrum.
Guest:And we did, we did, you started making great money on the road and then come out to Los Angeles and they want you to do six, three to six minutes.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It was nearly impossible to translate.
Guest:A lot of guys couldn't do it.
Guest:Couldn't do it.
Guest:You come here and Jim McCauley says, I can't, I can't put you on the Tonight Show with doing,
Guest:your sack jokes about your balls.
Guest:I said, I told you that's in the middle of you come and see me at the ice house.
Guest:And I got, I got an hour.
Guest:I just wanted you, you were supposed to be there at eight o'clock.
Guest:I said, just watch the beginning.
Guest:He told me so many times.
Guest:I saw Macaulay probably eight times.
Guest:He goes, you're funny, but this, this is not true.
Guest:Tonight Show is shit.
Marc:Right.
Marc:So Macaulay was like, because that was always the thing.
Marc:That was always the problem with the road guys.
Marc:It's like, I got to do five minutes.
Marc:I can't do five minutes clean.
Marc:I can't do five minutes.
Marc:You can't do five minutes clean?
Guest:What do you mean you can't do five minutes?
Guest:I scratch my balls in five minutes.
Guest:I can't do this in five minutes.
Guest:And then the short truth is,
Guest:I eventually get a call to do the Tonight Show, and I didn't want to do it because they want me on as Tim Allen because the Home Improvement hit.
Guest:Now, it's the number one show.
Guest:I go, I don't want to go on there as a sitcom guy.
Marc:Oh, you didn't get to do it as a stand-up before?
Guest:No, I get there, and right before I'm back there, and he said, can I go do some jokes?
Guest:And Freddy de Cordoba, and they go, what?
Guest:Can I just – I want to do some jokes.
Guest:And they said –
Guest:Well, they didn't know how to say no to me.
Guest:And I said, do you know where to stand?
Guest:And I went, I lied.
Guest:I guess I took my glasses off and I stood, they, they stood to Tim Allen.
Guest:I stopped and there's, I had no idea where I was.
Guest:It's a much smaller room than I thought it was going to be.
Guest:And the noise and the camera pedestal was right in front of me.
Guest:So I stopped and the curtain hit me in the side of the head because it shut.
Guest:So I'm panicking.
Guest:I'm sweating.
Guest:I didn't see the star.
Guest:They're moving all the bike booms.
Guest:I, I fricking died.
Guest:and then they said and then johnny was i'm in the i'm the guest so he had me come sit down and in the break he leans over he said kid you got to be funnier than that wow and i said i just i just died it was the last month he was on the air and that kind man looked at me and i said i can't believe i screwed that up because look come back next week i came back the next week
Guest:drilled it.
Guest:I mean, I got, I, that's all that I wanted in that whole, my whole life is to do that.
Guest:Stood there, killed it.
Guest:You did the thing which had come over, but I was going to come over anyway, the court of it.
Guest:And then Macaulay, of course, now my best friend, you, you, you drilled it.
Guest:I said, this is all I ever wanted to do.
Guest:I can do this thing.
Guest:And that was,
Marc:off that checklist be be courageous enough i told myself to write down what i really want i want to be on the tonight show yeah but like it's so interesting to me so you got booked as a panel guest for home improvement in its first season yeah and they didn't really acknowledge you as a stand-up so you're like i want to do stand-up and they and the show is fine i love that tv show i get it i get it so you kind of bullied them into letting you do stand-up and you and they weren't prepared for that and you went out there and bombed i bombed
Guest:I did.
Guest:The week later, I went out there and killed it.
Guest:I killed it.
Guest:And then got down with Johnny.
Guest:You're so lucky.
Guest:Oh, God, am I lucky.
Guest:You're lucky he said he would do that for you.
Guest:At that point, I was such a big... I mean, the home improvement went... It was huge.
Guest:It was 23 million people watch that show every Tuesday night.
Guest:How'd you get that show?
Guest:That I did the Showtime special.
Guest:All right.
Guest:And it was it killed everywhere.
Guest:It was big time.
Guest:And then Jeffrey Katzenberg and Michael Eisner wanted to meet me.
Guest:and they wanted to see me so i went to the improv which i never worked really and i worked i did the show there at the improv to show them they sat and had dinner with me and we met at disney they said we want to be in the tim allen business we want to be in a marriage with tim allen and i said i'd like to see the ring first and we made a joke and they offered me turner and hooch as a sitcom and i just said no that's tom angst
Guest:And then they want to be that.
Guest:Well, what was the one with the dead poet society?
Guest:I think it was Robin Williams.
Guest:The one he did.
Guest:I said, no, Williams already did a movie like that.
Guest:And they, I said, no, I don't want to do that.
Guest:They said, Disney wants to be in business with you.
Guest:Well, I don't want to, they had no idea what kind of money I was making on the road.
Guest:So they were offering me money.
Marc:That was half of what I had no idea of money that you could make in television.
Guest:No, but I didn't care.
Guest:I did.
Guest:I didn't want to do that.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And they said, no,
Guest:I went back to Michigan.
Guest:I'm on my outdoor mower.
Guest:I love mowing my own lawn with a big John Deere.
Guest:I'm sitting on that lawnmower.
Guest:My wife called and she said, Jeffrey Katzenberg's on the phone.
Guest:I get there and he goes, I'm stunned that you went back to Michigan.
Guest:I said, well, we had this conversation.
Guest:I don't want to do that.
Guest:He goes...
Guest:He never had been said no to like that.
Guest:And he goes, let me rephrase this.
Guest:You know what I was offering you?
Guest:I said, yeah, I appreciate the offer.
Guest:I just don't want to do that.
Guest:He goes, well, what would you want to do?
Guest:I said, what I would want to do is make a parody of this old house with Norm and Bob Villa.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:and have a neighbor that i can't see and i pitched it i want three boys not i just i would do what i do in michigan i i never really see my neighbor i just wave at this figure that's yeah that we had and i want to do that and then have a show within a show that is i break stuff all the time and he just said i don't know and then he got me together with the people that did uh cosby and roseanne and we all agreed that carsey warner uh no is a matt williams wind dancer oh
Guest:And he did, they took my act that I'd done to Showtime and kind of merged it into a character and the rest was gold.
Guest:I mean, luckily I had extremely competent director, John Passman and great writers and people, all good actors that taught me how to be
Marc:an actor well that was the model then right you know you you know you were enough of a defined character now was there a moment where you because you sort of were one of those guys that i you know i would say you had a hook wouldn't you oh yeah yeah so like you know did you know the the day that you came up with that hook and you're like oh oh yeah oh yeah he had a i did um
Guest:I did a regular show and then it was, as I recall, it was in Cincinnati, Ohio or Akron actually for Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company.
Guest:I did their corporate sales meeting early on in my career and I was doing my bits and there was men just eating and smoking cigarettes in the room.
Guest:No one was listening to me.
Guest:And I said, I'm never going to do this again.
Guest:I hate this.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I started mimicking the growling and grunting.
Guest:I hear I started doing that bit.
Guest:And all these men were going, that's funny.
Guest:And I started mimicking what men sound like when they're eating.
Guest:And that became that grunt.
Guest:Then I started doing lawnmowers and paint and hardware store stuff.
Guest:And we did a show for Gino Michelini in Los Angeles.
Guest:He taped me putting on the Friday Funnies or something.
Guest:They get eight or nine calls, 20 calls.
Guest:Who was that guy?
Guest:Instead, they got like 800 calls right away.
Guest:Who's that guy doing the lawnmower stuff?
Guest:As soon as you have something, as Bob Seger once told me, you've got to go to a town and come back instead in a month, not six months, come back a month later and see if they remember you.
Guest:If they remember who you are and you can put butts in the seats, you own it.
Guest:And I learned that lesson.
Guest:Do morning radio.
Guest:I don't care how late I stayed out.
Guest:Do morning radio.
Guest:Do morning radio and get a hook.
Guest:Get it so they remember you.
Guest:It's much like pop music.
Guest:that there's a thing in there that they remember.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:They remember the guy that barked, like, you know, did that caveman thing and talked about lawnmowers.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And the rest was really history because they could remember who, maybe not my name, but they remembered, you're the guy that barks like a Neanderthal.
Guest:And I said, that's me.
Marc:And you like doing radio.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I loved it in college.
Guest:I loved, I learned, I did voiceovers.
Guest:I've done voiceovers for Chevy, Kodak.
Marc:It's so funny that it's also funny that you have this weird relationship with a tense, not tense, but you have this kind of cranky relationship with kids and you're like you're like a kid's icon.
Marc:I mean, you're Buzz Lightyear, for God's sake.
Guest:That's my biggest joke ever.
Guest:God would go.
Guest:um what what is it you want and i said i want to do i want to be on the johnny carson show and then you've got to be able i used to say you can tell tell god exactly how you want that to happen otherwise it might not happen like you want it to yeah because i said i want to do the tonight show and god said okay next thing i'm doing santa claus buzz light your home improvement family shows and so wait a minute i forgot to tell you i hate kids
Guest:Now I'm like this.
Guest:You never told me that.
Guest:You just said you want to be on The Tonight Show.
Guest:You got to be careful.
Guest:You got to be very specific with me.
Guest:Otherwise, you're going to get it.
Guest:But this is how you did it.
Guest:And I said that, believe me, that did not go on.
Guest:I can't believe I was Santa Claus.
Guest:The script was Stephen Leo.
Guest:The comedians wrote it.
Guest:And it was dark, man.
Guest:It was so dark.
Guest:I shot and killed Santa.
Guest:The opening scene of the original movie, I shot him.
Guest:And he fell off the roof.
Guest:And the kid goes, you just killed Santa.
Guest:He said, well, he shouldn't have been on the roof.
Guest:He should have been at the mall where he belongs.
Guest:I thought he was robbing the house.
Guest:And they didn't.
Guest:As I recall, the head of the studio said, we want you in this movie.
Guest:We think it's funny.
Guest:And I said, it's funny.
Guest:It's movie.
Guest:I've literally one of the funnier scripts I've ever read that didn't get changed except for the opening scene, which they said, we can't start a Disney movie with you murdering Santa.
Guest:And I said, why?
Guest:You kill all the parents in every other movie.
Marc:But they wouldn't let you.
Guest:No, they said we started off.
Guest:So he disappears.
Marc:So it's interesting.
Marc:You've had this lifelong relationship with Disney.
Marc:Yep.
Marc:And it's interesting that, you know, I mean, I guess it speaks to the fact that you publicly, you know, you are a old school conservative and not a a right wing whack job.
It is.
Guest:I never, I never really, I just don't like, once I started making money, I had the silent partner that just took almost half of my money and never gave me anything for it.
Guest:And that was the taxes.
Guest:I've never liked taxes.
Guest:Whoever takes the taxes and never tells me what they do with it.
Guest:I'm a, I'm a fiscal conservative person.
Guest:I get it.
Guest:My family's, that's it.
Guest:It's all I, I don't like you taking.
Guest:I work pretty hard for this stuff and I accomplished a lot.
Guest:And I was,
Guest:handicapped by my own errors it's all my fault i get that yeah but i had this silent partner never like taxes never like what they do with taxes and the bullshit both sides it's not their money the silent partner being the government the government i never really liked that i don't like that are you concerned or has disney ever said anything to you are you too big an earner for them to give a shit
Guest:No, because I said the powers that be, I literally don't preach anything.
Marc:Right.
Guest:I said, what I've done is I've just not...
Guest:joined into, as I call it, the we culture.
Guest:I'm not telling anybody else how to live.
Guest:I don't like that.
Guest:It was like, we should do this or we should do that.
Guest:And then once I realized that the last president pissed people off, I kind of liked that.
Guest:So it was fun to just not say anything, didn't join in the
Guest:the the lynching crowd but yeah yeah you know you you you got a kick at his belligerent anger i just i didn't and i even know the clintons yeah and bill clinton has been a very genuinely nice guy to me and i used to send when he was president i sent them uh christmas stuff yeah
Guest:is from disney and i sent all the movies that we did and merry christmas from them and i sent it to bush too and i sent it the obamas i'm just i'm a bolster i just didn't think that hillary should have been president so it's like in the end there like she just you go the other direction and i said it's no nothing personal about it if you don't like it then wait till the next election so you stay you you don't you don't engage with that stuff
Guest:No, I said if you want to engage philosophically, that's great.
Guest:And that's where I get into trouble these days.
Guest:If I get in philosophical discussions, that's interesting.
Guest:Where do we where do we where do we start?
Marc:Right.
Marc:And, you know, who has time for that?
Marc:And what what outlet would that be?
Marc:And then, you know, you don't want to get hoisted on your own petard by depending.
Guest:Well, no, if you've ever been in a debate class, which I have, debate itself is a winning and losing proposition.
Guest:It doesn't mean you're right or wrong.
Guest:Mm hmm.
Guest:You just won the debate.
Guest:You scored a point.
Guest:It's an old Roman thing, qui bono.
Guest:Who profits by this?
Guest:And I've asked, anytime we get in an argument, I said, what's your point?
Guest:Let's just get to the point.
Guest:Do you want me to...
Guest:love this or dislike this?
Guest:No, I just want you to see clearly.
Guest:Well, I can see clearly.
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:That's not my problem.
Guest:I just said, what is your point?
Guest:Qui bono?
Guest:Who profits by the position that you're pushing?
Guest:Oh, nobody.
Guest:Why are you asking me those questions?
Guest:I just have to be clear about what it is we're doing here.
Guest:Do you want me to have a position?
Guest:What would be your point at the end of this?
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:I get it.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:Most people say nothing.
Guest:I just want you to know the truth.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:So do we agree on fundamental elements of the truth?
Guest:No.
Guest:And as I said earlier, and then debates over, nobody watching the store.
Guest:There's people in high positions that out and out just make shit up.
Guest:And they kind of look around and realize that there's no penalty for that.
Marc:And then that that's, that's insane.
Marc:That's insanity, dude.
Marc:And yeah.
Marc:And, uh, and nobody, uh, and the thing is, is that everybody thinks they can get what, get away with shit now.
Marc:A lot of dubious sources out there.
Guest:Yeah, or no sources.
Guest:Make it up.
Guest:There's nobody around to say you were wrong, so you go ahead with it.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Now, what's the emotional sort of feeling about the Last Man Standing ending?
Marc:You've been with these people for years now.
Guest:I can't...
Guest:Yeah, I'm so sad I'm having a tough time because I adore the crew, what we've been through.
Guest:We've had life, death.
Guest:uh canceled not canceled the crowd resurrected us on fox fox has been great abc was great but the the writers have been great he's got better and better then we added leno we had my the youngest daughter went on to be a a movie star and she keeps coming back and she it's it's like a real family to me and um
Guest:I can't say that I'm not.
Guest:Knowing it was the last year, home improvement, we decided it was last year.
Guest:We'd had enough.
Guest:This one, we're still going.
Guest:And then to end it right now, we've got four more to do.
Guest:And I'm.
Guest:Relish in every moment of it.
Guest:It reminds me, unfortunately, you have a very sick relative that's on life support, but they're not going to last.
Guest:And I said, it saddens me.
Guest:I'm not right now excited about moving on because I've spent so much of my heart and soul into keeping this thing going.
Guest:And I love every minute of it.
Guest:I love where...
Guest:And I'm looking around the set every day, like today.
Guest:God, I've looked at this stuff for nine years.
Guest:And Hector Elizondo and I become close friends.
Guest:And I said, we've grown together.
Guest:The kids were little girls when we started this.
Guest:And Nancy Travis and I, I said, we've become great friends.
Guest:And I said, it's very difficult.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And this new show.
Marc:Now, do you I'm assuming that you've got money saved.
Marc:You just you don't you don't want to stop working, apparently.
Guest:No, I don't.
Guest:I love what I do.
Guest:I love being funny.
Guest:This assembly required was a young producer, Kate Fox.
Guest:And I've been pushing this around for quite a while.
Guest:And I like mentoring people.
Guest:me included, about getting stuff done.
Guest:And so we put an idea together about celebrating the people that do solve problems, like a line producer and people in my business that just don't care about politics.
Guest:We want to get the movie done for this price.
Guest:This is what you can do.
Guest:And builders, I'm an old designer and I like building things.
Guest:The contractor has got to solve all the problems.
Guest:The designer, it'll be great.
Guest:We'll have windows everywhere.
Guest:The contractor goes, can't really afford all that.
Guest:And it reminds me of politics.
Guest:The designer is the Democrat.
Guest:It'll be beautiful and it'll be wonderful and let all this light in.
Guest:The contractor goes, but you're going to need 30-foot windows and all your furniture will get...
Guest:faded quickly.
Guest:And then, oh, invented the beauty, but you've got to compromise somehow.
Guest:And I want to celebrate the people that solve problems.
Marc:It's funny that the metaphor is that the Democrats are going to have to compromise.
Guest:Well, both of them, the contractor would like to build a brick building and the designer, the liberals have this beautiful idea and it's wonderful.
Guest:Their hearts are big and open and it'll be great and it'll light in and it'll be eco-friendly and the contractor goes, well, it can't be because the plumbing's got to do this and
Guest:Can we do it this way?
Guest:Put the generator, blah, blah, blah.
Guest:And I said, so Assembly Required started off that way.
Guest:The virus hit.
Guest:They had to change the format.
Guest:I'm thrilled at how they were able to develop the show.
Guest:It's changed a bit.
Guest:So how does it work?
Guest:Is it a game show?
Guest:Now it's a competition.
Guest:You go three different builders, get three different boxes, some random parts in there.
Guest:They got to figure out what the parts are, build something out of those parts.
Guest:Next build, they add those parts, expand it, modify it.
Guest:And the last one, you got to combine it with something big and make a big build, get shipped.
Guest:Now it used to be, the idea was to be all done in the same big studio.
Guest:Now it's at their own, because of the virus, we had to send everything to them.
Guest:Made it kind of interesting because you see,
Guest:Men and women, problem solvers.
Guest:And my God, whatever we screw up humans, we can fix.
Marc:So it's like Apollo 13 every week?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Some parts of it, you know, there were a lot of struggles that we didn't get through.
Guest:I've been in movies, theater, stand-up, television.
Guest:This format is very hard on me because it's on, it's real.
Guest:And I sometimes, I lose it and get moody and I had to get, like the director said, you've never done this before, have you?
Guest:I said, what, stand around for eight hours, get filmed talking about shit?
Guest:No, because half the time I'll say crap and they go, you can't say that.
Guest:You know, I cut myself into some
Guest:You know, I get into doing comedy.
Guest:Raw.
Guest:I mean, working without a net comedy.
Marc:Well, that's exciting.
Marc:Well, Tim, I wish you the best of success with it.
Guest:Well, thank you, Mark.
Guest:I really appreciate the time, man.
Marc:Yeah, it was good talking to you, man.
Marc:It really was.
Marc:You know, we'd never met before, and I've known your stuff for years.
Marc:And, you know, we're both comics, and it's always good to talk to a comic.
Guest:Yeah, it really is, man.
Marc:Take care of yourself.
Guest:All right, buddy.
Guest:Thanks for everything.
Marc:There you go.
Marc:Tim Allen.
Marc:Road comic.
Marc:Real deal.
Marc:Last Man Standing is on its final episodes.
Marc:That airs on Thursdays on Fox.
Marc:And the new show, Assembly Required, is on History Channel.
Marc:And also, just a side note, it looks like I'm having drop-ins on my Instagram Live, which I do most days in the morning.
Marc:I do a guitar one, usually on Sundays.
Marc:And there was a Kevin Morby situation.
Marc:I didn't know who Kevin Morby was.
Marc:And I still don't know his music that well, but I started talking about not knowing who he was, and we ended up getting closure on that on my IG Live on Sunday, yesterday.
Marc:Also, Sadler Vaden.
Marc:I did two yesterday.
Marc:I was playing my guitar part.
Marc:He was watching.
Marc:He plays guitar for Jason Isbell, and he hopped on.
Marc:We told some Jason stories.
Marc:He did a couple of Mike Campbell bits, and he showed me his B-Bender.
Marc:Yeah, he whipped out his B-Bender.
Marc:So you can check my Instagram lives, or you can go follow me on Instagram, at Mark Maron.
Marc:Anyway, look, I'll play some.
Marc:This is the guitar I was working on.
Marc:When I was rudely interrupted by Sadler Vaden.
Marc:He's great.
Marc:His record's great.
Guest:Anyway, here.
Marc:All right.
Marc:Enough.
Enough.
Thank you.
guitar solo
guitar solo
guitar solo
Guest:Boomer lives.
Guest:Monkey.
Guest:LaFonda.
Guest:Cat angels everywhere.